Wee Tumblr Fics
by Atlin Merrick
Summary: Tiny 300-400 words stories about John and Sherlock that I publish each week on Tumblr. (All ratings)
1. SHERLOCK

**S.H.E.R.L.O.C.K.**

Ess aich ee are el oh see kay.

It's long, as names go, and more than passing strange. People almost always echo it back after an introduction. "Sherlock," they'll say, "how unique."

Depending on his mood, the consulting detective lets the small talk pass unremarked, but sometimes—not so often, not any more—he rattles off a string of on-the-spot deductions, rarely kind, hardly ever complementary.

Because like the man it labels, that name's full of aggressive angles, vowels and consonants that poke at your mouth. Your throat catches on the K, closes up tight, and if you're as moody as the man, you may hold that against him, whether it makes sense or not.

He's never thought much of his name. When he was a kid other kids mocked it, rhyming it with every word under the sun, the real goers being _shock, frock, _and the ever-enduring _cock._

For all its distinctiveness the name's actually hard to remember. Most people cobble up the 'lock,' but go blank as they reach for the rest, emphatically not what he wanted in those early days of begging and badgering for access to cases, witnesses, suspects, and clues.

By his mid-30s he'd more or less stopped hearing it as a name. It became merely a way to be summoned, a form of email or text if you will, something people said when they were ready to admit they were out of their depth.

And then there was John.

The first time John said his name, Sherlock wasn't even there, he was flying across rooftops in search of pink. The second time he was still flying, but it was that brain soaring, fast-talking a flock of deductions right in Lestrade's face.

Of course there was a third time, a fourth, a fifth…a dozen times a dozen instances when John said his name in those first months they were flatmates. But the first time he really heard the silly word, heard the ess, the aich, the ee, and all the rest as more than just _noise,_ John was standing in Sherlock's bedroom doorway, just twenty minutes away from becoming his lover.

It's been a dozen times a dozen months since that long-ago night, but even now Sherlock sometimes goes still when John murmurs those eight letters. Sometimes he'll deduce John's mood, wants, or needs from just that one word, sometimes he won't.

But what Sherlock Holmes will always do, even now, so many years later, he'll hear the grace John Watson gives his difficult name, and he will now, ever, and always…answer.

_Don't you wonder what Sherlock thinks of his unique name? I sometimes do. This is a short fic I put up on Tumblr today; I write a short story for Tumblr every week, now I'm going to collect them here. Each stands alone, but I'll be gathering all the previous ones into a single document and putting that up here, too. Eventually._


	2. I Prefer to Text

**I Prefer to Text**

_I prefer to text._

It was one of the first things Sherlock said when they met; it was one of the last he said before leaving for Amsterdam.

And while John wrapped up two cases in London, text Sherlock did. From the crime scene:

_The wife's a damned liar._

From the back of a cab:

_So help me I think the husband _ate _some of the evidence._

From the Ministry:

_The Minister just touched my arse._

From his hotel room:

_I'm this close to throwing someone out a window._

And that's when John texted back: _Video chat in 20 minutes. Important to the case._

Here's the thing: John knows that, neurophysiologically, texting does nothing to reduce stress. Add voice to long-distance communication, however, and oxytocin—pleasure—hormones surge. Yeah, well John was god damn going to surge Sherlock's. After he took care of one thing.

"I don't have time," Sherlock groused twenty minutes later, before John had even adjusted his laptop. For a moment the good doctor didn't reply; then he said, voice low, "Hello, love."

The world's only consulting detective squinted, then slow-blinked at his lover's image. "You just…masturbated."

Face flushed, hair mussed, lower lip swollen from quite intentional biting, John smiled. "I miss you."

Sherlock's eyes, his muscles, his damn _breathing_ turned soft, easy, slow. Cortisol plummeted, oxytocin took its place, and John said, "Just wanted to say that. Ring me tonight and I'll say it again. Later, love."

Sherlock had every intention of ringing John that night. The thing is, he solved the case two hours later and was home before nightfall.

Neither of them texted for the next couple days.

___The power of voice over text messaging inspired this fic, link sent by Tony. To learn more, search Wired . com with the term "instant messaging stress."_


	3. Second-Hand Smoke

**Second-Hand Smoke**

Sherlock slammed the front door open, slammed it closed. "Eleven days!"

John looked up from his paper with casual interest. Sherlock only ever yelled under four conditions: He was bored, he was drunk, he was high, or he was coming.

John's voluminous sweetie was smiling, so he wasn't bored. His gaze was sharp; he wasn't drunk. And unless he had a skill of which John was unaware, he was not coming. No, Sherlock's skin was flushed, his tongue darted around his mouth, and he sort of vibrated. That meant one thing.

"You've been smoking. And it hasn't been _six_ days since your last you-think-I-don't-know-about-it cigarette."

Sherlock threw his coat in the direction of a chair. It missed.

"I smoked nothing! I, however, second-hand smoked a great deal! Because eleven days is exactly how long most of London kept their resolution to quit. High Street Kensington was a positive _oasis_ of tar and nicotine! I feel so good I could do _nothing _for a solid hour."

John blinked. Folded his paper. Because he knew nothing was not what was going to happen next.

Sherlock threw himself onto the sofa, jamming up against John.

"Mmmmm," hummed Sherlock.

John laid his paper on the coffee table. Because he knew one thing always happened after his lover smoked a lot.

"Hmmmmm," Sherlock added.

John undid his belt, button, and zipper, lifted his hips and shoved pants and trousers to his ankles.

"Ahhhhhhh," Sherlock sighed.

The good detective squirmed low, pushed his head down between John's legs with a happy grunt.

Yes, one thing always happens after Sherlock gets high on nicotine. He gets very, very _oral._

_Originally published to Tumblr eleven days after New Years. If you hadn't already guessed…_


	4. Grief and Joy

**Grief and Joy**

Sometimes grief is best tempered with joy. Even Sherlock knows that.

Ordinarily John would have shouted. Stomped his feet. He'd have sworn and raged and done all the things he so often does to express his fury and pain, but not today.

Today he'd gone silent with his grief. Because he'd known for three long years, _waited_ for so long that by the time the cancer took his grandmother—the last living relative he had other than Harry, and the only kin who actually cared for him without reservation, qualification, or a hand held out for cash—by then John simply had no rage, no energy for anger. He had nothing.

So Sherlock gave him something.

"Talk with me," he said, mouth soft at his lover's ear as the good doctor stared sightless out their bedroom window.

John shook his head. _There's nothing to say. No words. I'm tired. Just…tired._

"Stop thinking, John Watson, and talk to me," Sherlock whispered, hands resting light at his sweetheart's waist, an advance force, lying in wait.

John grunted, about to say something self-pitying, maybe self-righteous, perhaps—

"OH HELL NO!"

Oh hell _yes._

Sherlock didn't just know the reason John preferred briefs to boxers, or why a southpaw sometimes wanked with his right hand instead of left. Hell no, Sherlock also knew how hard to dig spindly fingers into John's ribs, exactly how long to tickle before he went all butch and tossed his sweetie onto the bed.

The tickling went on, relentless, until the laughter turned to swearing, the swearing to tears, the tears in time to legs spreading, wrapping round hips, to mouth seeking mouth, to urgent need and eventually, blessedly, finally to giggly-moaning-grateful relief.

Yes, sometimes grief…well it's best tempered with joy. Joy wherever you can find it.

_(Written just before watching Reichenbach, because damn it no matter what occurs _we_ get to decide how the story goes just as much as Mofftiss—John and Sherlock are ours quite as much as theirs. So fuck it. Let there be joy. And boy porn.)_


	5. Paddington Bear

**Paddington Bear**

One admirer sent him blood, another a dead bird. But mostly fans give Sherlock things like antique magnifying glasses. Deerstalkers. Puzzles.

John's fans send him sweets. Knit caps. Knit jumpers. Knit scarves. And bears. Bears. _So much with the god damn bears._

John knows people mean well, really he does. Hell, John's been small most of his life, a bit round for much of it, too. He's been described with every plush diminutive possible, from cuddly, cute, and cushy, to adorable, sweet, and snuggly.

But this was too much. "Oh dear god."

Sherlock peered over the top of his newspaper and across their desk. John just stared at his hands.

Because the bear in them? The tubby little oatmeal-coloured bear that had just come in today's post? It wore a green raincoat. Just like John's. It had red boots just like his. Oh sure, he hardly wore them, but he _had_ them.

"It's me. It's _me."_ John pressed his forehead to the edge of the desk. Kind of banged it once or twice. "Cuddly. Snuggly. Cute."

Maybe he should spiff up his wardrobe. Start wearing suits. Button-down shirts. He could lose a little weight. Put on some muscle. Get a crew-cut, or—

"Strong." Sherlock was suddenly there beside him, whispering warm against his ear.

"Dauntless." His right hand ran slow along John's thigh.

"Passionate." His left wriggled under John's jumper, splayed across his back.

"Fearless. Formidable." His teeth grazed John's neck.

"And one more important thing. One more." Sherlock's hands and mouth headed south.

_"Fuckable."_

_Aurora-Boreali wanted a John Watson-Paddington Bear story and Google "Paddington Bear green coat" and you can see why. I mean, you can, can't you? Poor John._


	6. Cornucopia

**Cornucopia**

They had other things to do. Important things. Crimey wimey things. They _really_ must be going.

"John, we _really_ must be going."

_Hmmmmm_ was Sherlock's husband's reply. A sort of low, staticky hum of…what? Need? Want? Desire? Mmm, yes, that was it.

But John was in no hurry. He'd already been going at it for a good ten minutes. Going at it slowly, meditatively, as if the colour, the curves, the god damn _cornucopia_ of it all was new.

On his belly on their bed, stripped bare of winter pajamas, Sherlock rested chin on arms and gave in without struggle. Yes they'd be late. Again. Yes, Lestrade would blame him and not John. Again. Oh but yes, when John took the world and somehow magically slowed it down to this, just this—to the two of them with sweet, sweet time—well however much he might grouse later, Sherlock always loved it now.

And John? Well he loved this man. His brain. His heart. His body. And now**, **right now, stretched out warm beside Sherlock, he loved watching his strong fingers grip his husband's sumptuous bum, loved the yield of that sweet flesh, loved visualizing what he could do to it.

Some mornings _this_ was all he'd do. Run his palm gentle over curves, softly stroking, carefully kissing. And later, inevitably, someone would say to one of them or both, "Don't you look bright-eyed today?"

Some mornings, though, John would do more. He'd nibble, then bite. Lick, then tongue. Fingers would be made slick, then search, sliding deep. And later, inevitably, someone would say to one of them or both, "Don't you look like the cat who ate the canary."

John always replied with a saucy lick of the lips. Sherlock would just grin.

_This is for Random Nexus and Livia Carica, both of whom were riffing awhile ago on the delectable idea of John's fingers kneading Sherlock's opulent back end. Now excuse me, time to head desk briskly and sort of bite things._


	7. Bad John

**Bad John**

News flash: You can be in love and still think your husband's a dick at times.

Not that Sherlock would ever, _ever_ use that word to describe John because, frankly, just no.

That's all right, he's got plenty of other sobriquets for his husband. Both versions: Good John and Bad John.

Good John makes Sherlock eat—_and_ cooks the food. He swears mightily when the smoke alarm goes off—and enters the fray with a fire extinguisher. Good John crooks his finger as they queue, then whispers in Sherlock's ear—the things he says often cause raging erections. In public.

_That_ John is Sherlock's tiny tyrant. His diminutive darling. His sweetheart, his husband, his love.

Then there's Bad John.

Bad John threatens dismemberment when Sherlock breaks their crockery—_and_ brandishes a butter knife to make his point. Bad John complains when Sherlock licks his plate at a restaurant—and throttles his shins under the table. Bad John says, "Ha ha ha, think again mister," when Sherlock tries to get a leg over after crockery's been broken, a plate licked, holes shot in walls, or a consulting detective's been rude to friends.

_That_ John is…is…well that John's called "I'm not talking to you right now, you know," and "That wasn't my fault technically, if you just think about it," and also "I'm sorry. No, really I am." Because, damn it, Bad John? Bad John's usually _right._

News flash: You can be in love with your husband and _still_ be a dick at times. But apparently that compact little creature? That pint-sized potentate? Well it seems he'll love you anyway.

_Like a certain diminutive despot we all love, Livia Carica has bad days. This was my tiny effort to brighten hers. To my delight, Livia responded in kind and it is awesome: tinyurl dot com slash tumblr-fic-epithets_


	8. Blue

**Blue**

"—and of course I can cook."

Proving the point, Sherlock placed a plate in front of his seated sweetie, then stood by proudly.

John poked the proffered pastry. "Hithertofore proof of that has generally been lacking, Sherlock."

The detective looked down his nose at his doubting darling. "That's not a word, John."

The good doctor lifted his plate, _sniffed. _"Just because the word 'generally' would never pass your lips doesn't mean—"

Sherlock may or may not have stamped his foot. "You're not amusing."

John grinned up at his one true love. "I am so."

Damn it, yes, he was. But that wasn't the point.

"The point John, is that I've made you a cake to celebrate the publication of your article in the _British Medical Journal, _and if—"

"May I ask why it's so…blue?" John raised the cake to eye level, squinted.

Sherlock sighed the sigh of the ceaselessly misunderstood. "Your _article_ John, was about _hypothermic _shock and since—"

John didn't mean to giggle. He didn't mean to follow that with a chuckle, a guffaw, and then outright hilarity, but he did. When at last he slid boneless from his chair and to the kitchen floor—the sticky, dear-god-what-is-this-matted-in-my-hair regret would come later—Sherlock was also smiling.

Not long after the detective joined his still giggling lover under the table, straddled the prone man, and hand-fed him surprisingly tasty bits of hypothermic-blue cake.

"Cooking's simple chemistry, John Watson. You merely measure precisely, beat, then whip." Sherlock reached between them, took the measure of his man with one questing hand, then whispered, "Here…let me show you."

_I posted a pic of a blue cake on my Tumblr and Zombilexi suggested I write a fic for it. So I did._


	9. Sulky Woe

**Sulky Woe**

Sherlock had every right to an epic bout of sulky woe. Ordinarily John's completely unwilling to put those words in that order.

"Does it hurt?"

Sherlock fidgeted on the exam bench, sighed with such shuddery long-suffering the good doctor was put in mind of an overanxious six year old he'd treated many years ago.

More wriggling of a broad bum on a paper-covered bench. "It's _throbbing."_

John brushed sweaty fringe from Sherlock's eyes. "I'm sorry love, but if I hadn't done it the mugger would've done much worse."

Sherlock groped at the back of his own head. "Ouch!"

Hooking a finger in his sweetheart's cuff, John tugged Sherlock's arm down. "If you'd just _stopped talking_ when he told you to, we wouldn't be here."

Sherlock twiddled with John's fingers, sulked in silence. Epically.

"As soon as the doctor returns with the all-clear we'll go. Then I'll apologize properly."

Sherlock let his heels kick sporadically at the side of the exam table, shoved his lower lip way the hell out. "How?"

"I'll buy you toffee pudding." Sherlock sort of smiled. "And those Friedrich condensers you want." Sherlock sat straighter. "And the protein Western blot kit." Sherlock grinned for real. His hand drifted toward the back of his head again; John caught fidgety fingers before they pressed. "And a new riding crop."

Sherlock stopped wriggling at last. "Really?"

John stroked a pretty cheekbone, watched a squirmy tongue slide slow over cupid's bow lips. The good doctor sort of, um, started wriggling against the side of the paper-covered exam bench. "It's the least I can do," he breathed, leaning in, "after pistol whipping you."

They didn't exactly wait for the doctor to return. Or the all clear.

_A billion years ago I offered to write a wee fic for Chaosiswalking, after she left a lovely comment. She requested pouty!Sherlock and caretaker!John._

_P.S. These wee fics turned out to be more popular than I thought and you're kindly commenting up a storm. I'm so #$% not going to be able to reply to all of your wonderful remarks each time because I'm an idiot and publish across three sites. THANK YOU HOWEVER THANK YOU. Truly, thank you so much!_


	10. Seagulls

**Seagulls**

Sherlock didn't open his eyes. Of course the consulting detective knew a few things anyway.

He knew it was five fifty in the morning. It had rained an hour previous. His husband had been awake for ten minutes. And the hard-on between his own legs meant he'd just roused from a very good dream.

Sherlock pressed his forehead between his sweetheart's shoulder blades and moaned softly.

After a moment the mattress dipped. Then, a few seconds later, John snugged his warm bare back against Sherlock's front, guided his husband's cock between now-lubed thighs. Sherlock sighed soft and started to thrust.

Sometimes _this _was their early-morning sex, their sleepy, lazy, slow sex. Pushing languidly between John's legs, Sherlock smiled faintly when he crossed his ankles, pressing thighs together more tightly.

Sherlock nudged his nose into John's hair, snaked a hand across his belly, pulled his husband closer, thrust a little faster.

But…

Sherlock doesn't need to open his eyes. Not to see, to deduce, to know.

The detective stilled, listening. "Seagulls," he murmured. After a moment John nodded.

Sometimes gulls whirl over 221B, crying for the sea. Sometimes the sound makes John ache for the shore, for something far off, for something he can't name.

John had been listening to the birds.

Tugging his husband closer still, Sherlock whispered, "Seaford. We'll stay the weekend."

John pushed his bum against Sherlock's belly. "Yes," he murmured. "But I think we're in the middle of something."

"It's all right, I—"

John tugged Sherlock's hand up, kissed the palm. "It's all right," he echoed, rocking his hips gently. "Don't stop."

Both men wound together more tightly.

Sometimes you don't need to open your eyes to see. Just your heart.


	11. Flake

**Flake**

A Flake candy bar falls apart when you bite it. Which is a good metaphor for John Watson right now.

John was fine, just _fine_ five minutes ago, writing up their most recent case while it was fresh in his mind, but Sherlock? Well _his_ part was done, so now he's bored, he wants _attention,_ and…and…

Oh fuck it, here's the thing: Sherlock's buck naked right now, okay? He's got his head hanging off the sofa cushions, his lean legs up over the back of the couch and propped against the wall, okey doke? And on his gorgeous feet are a pair of beautifully fussy red stilettos with damned _bows_ on their backs, all right?

Now, combine all this with the absurdity of Sherlock 'eating' a damned chocolate bar that breaks into dozens of crumbly pieces the second you glance at it and what you have is a doctor who can't stop watching a detective not so much consume chocolate as scatter it along the expanse of his long bare body, from breast bone to belly to—

"God damn it Sherlock, I can't _think_ when you…when…you…"

Oh that just wasn't right. Chocolate does not belong _there_ doing _that_ and the fact that it _is_ there and Sherlock's doing _that_ should be…it…should…

"If," breathed John, "_if_ I forget where we found that yellow pearl and why the doctor hid it in that particular spot, well it's on your head Sherlock."

Fair warning given, the good doctor stood, swaggered over to that sofa, and then _he _was on Sherlock's head. So to speak.

_Verucasalt123 shared a few excellent prompts with me; there was one about a Flake bar and heels and…and well here you go._

.


	12. A Study in Red

**A Study in Red**

"Mmmm…it's for a case."

Sherlock studied himself in the mantle mirror as John came up behind him, still talking.

"You're going under cover."

Sherlock lifted his chin, shifted his gaze. John placed heavy grocery bags on the floor, held his sweetheart's eye.

"You have to blend in."

Sherlock slow blinked, arched a brow. In reflecting glass John looked at Sherlock looking at him.

"The case has something to do with a stolen will. No, a potato crisps heir. No, an actor."

Sherlock rolled his eyes, grinned. John fingered the hair at the back of his lover's neck, murmured, "Did I get any of that right?

The great detective turned, leaned elbows on the mantle, assumed a haughty pose. "It's for a case, yes. Under cover, also yes. It has nothing to do with heirs or actors, however, but may concern fraud."

John stepped close again, tugged at the elastic waist of Sherlock's pajama bottoms.

"And what're you doing?"

John peered into shadowy confines. "Trying to see if the carpet matches the curtains."

Sherlock tugged John's finger from fine linen PJs and said, "Now why would I do that?"

John stood on tip-toe, weaved fingers into a froth of newly-red curls, "Because you're a completist." He tugged his lover down into a kiss.

Sherlock didn't admit that he _had_ toyed with dying his genital hair to match his now bright-ginger locks. He knew John knew anyway.

After awhile things started happening inside detective-y jim-jams. John grinned, slid slow to his knees, pulling Sherlock's pajamas down till they were just below a pert arse. Murmuring against a froth of fine dark curls he whispered, "I'm a completist, too."

And then the good doctor went about proving it.

_This is for LassieLowrider who said nice things to me on Twitter. She also said ginger!Lock and I said hell yes._


	13. Virginity

**Virginity**

There are all kinds of virginity.

There's the never-been-kissed sort. John lost that at thirteen. Sherlock just before sixteen.

There's the never-had-sex kind. John lost that at seventeen, Sherlock at thirty-four.

And then there's, well, there's the never had _anal-_sex kind of virginity and John and Sherlock both lost that within the same week, Sherlock first.

The morning they made this new kind of love John almost had heart failure. So scared was he of doing it wrong, of hurting Sherlock, of coming too fast, the good doctor quite nearly didn't come at all.

Well he needn't have worried.

Almost as soon as John slid slow inside his lover's long body, Sherlock sighed, wrapped arms and legs around smooth flesh, and pulled his sweetheart close.

As John murmured endearments and diminutives—"It's all right baby, breathe my love, it's fine"—Sherlock actually giggled, drunk on equal parts pleasure, pain, and the sweet heat of John's bare skin.

And as John thrust soft, slow, and so-very-right, the good detective's gentle caresses became nails leaving pretty tracks along his lover's back.

By the time Sherlock came—long before John—he was so overdosed on pleasure his toes were curled and he was quite possibly speaking in tongues.

Yes, there's all kinds of virginity, and too many are lost in ways far less sweet. But Sherlock, and later that week John, were lucky. They lost this kind to each other and the only regret either had was that they didn't do it sooner.

Well that, and maybe it've been nice to record it.

Ahem.

_I wanted to write something for the so-very-gifted Kuuttamo. When I asked what she'd like she requested a story to go with an incredibly beautiful virgin!Sherlock drawing of hers that I love. This is that (slightly silly) tale. About tail, I guess. (Google: Kuuttamo and sherlock breathe and you'll find the image!)_


	14. Eat

**Eat**

There are two gazes with which John Watson sees Sherlock Holmes.

There's the lover's eye that looks upon that man and finds _oh_ such lushness. The deep curve of his sweetheart's lower back and the extravagance of what comes after. The swell of lean muscle in arms and legs. The shadowed hollows of that fine neck.

And then there's the doctor's gaze that looks upon Sherlock Holmes and what it sees is far less lyrical.

_One. Two. Three._

When he first fell in love with Sherlock that's what John did in their bed, out loud and often. He counted his lover's protruding rib bones and then he'd fall silent, a heavy hand resting still and protective over that hungry place.

_This far and no farther._

John never said that to Sherlock. Never made grand pronouncements about what he'd do. John just went and fucking _did it._

And _it_ was fight dirty. To get Sherlock to eat John played to the man's pride, his arrogance, his distractibility. He tricked him, cajoled him, made threats. In the end he offered up his own body as the ultimate enticement and in the end…_it worked._

Sherlock ate. And ate. And as if it were merely something he'd forgotten _how_ to do, once painstakingly relearned he actually _continued_ doing it.

And John, so much better than brilliant, praised his sweetheart's new body. He lavished it with touches, trembled it with moans. He admired it, tickled it, dressed it, and stripped it. And he said _I love you, I love you, I love you._ But the words he didn't say were the ones Sherlock heard clearest: _If you starve yourself again, my love…I promise you I will go hungry, too._

Sherlock has really only one gaze with which he sees, but that one's quite enough. He sees John, every stern-boned inch of him. And what he sees he'll always cherish and most of all, struggle to protect.

And so Sherlock will eat. _He will eat._

_Annacarrota's beautiful drawing (Google: annacarrota charcoals blushes and it's the first link) inspired this. Self-starvation isn't the answer, it's never the answer if you think it is, you're asking the wrong question. Don't do it. Never do it. Find a better, saner way to be strong. I did, long ago, you can, too. You _can.


	15. Tango

**Tango**

It wasn't for a case. Or an experiment. It wasn't to explain a theory, prove a hypothesis, or cure a bout of boredom.

It was for John.

For five straight nights he did it, though Sherlock wouldn't tell John just what _it_ was. All the good doctor knew was that Sherlock left for four hours, and when he returned home each evening his cheeks were flushed and he was always half hard.

Yet it was fine. It was all fine.

Because after three years of marriage John knows many things about Sherlock Holmes. He knows the lanky creature's even smarter than he appears. He's also as daft as he often seems. But most of all he's devoted. In his distracted, self-focused way, Sherlock is as faithful and true as any swan to his mate.

The point was proven ten days later when the man who forgets holidays, who's bad at birthdays, who never knows what to give to this man who asks for so little…just this once he didn't forget and this once Sherlock _knew._

"You look beautiful."

John grinned down at the bright laces of his new shoes. He felt six feet tall and it had nothing to do with the loft of those shiny heels and everything to do with—

John looked up, blushed.

—with how Sherlock looked at him right now.

The crowd around them was tempestuous, the music emphatic, so the good doctor couldn't ask how his husband knew he loved the tango, or where Sherlock had gone for his intensive week of lessons.

No, all John could do was open his arms.

Tall as a reed on heels of his own, Sherlock stepped into that warm shelter, and on the evening of John's forty-fourth birthday he and his one true love, they danced.

_Again, Kuuttamo's beautiful art was my inspiration (Google: Kuuttamo and __rooooxanne)_. And I'll say no more because you must go look at what that woman can do.  



	16. JOHN

**J.O.H.N.**

He says it more often than he ought.

No, that's wrong. There's really no 'ought' in the using of a name. You can say it, sing it, or whisper it as frequently as you damn well like. But most of us? We utter names infrequently; most of us simply start talking. "Yes, tea would be nice," or "Let's get going."

In this way, as in so many others, Sherlock's different.

"John," he'll murmur in drowsy morning light, "we've got to be at the Yard in an hour." It's not a conscious decision, making his first word his husband's name, but it's what he does, sliding a long arm around a warm waist and going on to make them both very late.

"You'll have to go to Camberwell for those keys, John, all right?" Lord forbid there's hesitation in the reply while someone _chews his toast._ Suddenly the air's peppered with, "John? _John,_ did you hear me, John?" Being as his sweetheart's sitting right across the table the eventual answer is _yes,_ often followed by a lyrical string of curses.

"Look at me, John," Sherlock says, even when they're the only two people in the room, even when there's clearly no one else to whom he could be speaking or to whom he right now owes abject apology. Sometimes that _is_ his apology, the sighing of a name once, twice, three times, his large hand cupping a jutting chin, pulling a small man close for a lingering and repentant kiss.

"This is Dr. John Watson," he'll say almost smugly, whether the one to whom he's offering the introduction is a new barista or an old barrister, an inquisitive child or neighbor's just moved in across the street.

Before sex, during love making, after a sweaty fuck, in the middle of a case, a chase, as they queue for coffees, whether they're in a crowd, alone, or among friends, Sherlock says it and says it, all _day _he says it.

And then finally, as they lay exhausted in bed, another day vanquishing evil quite handily done, he'll tug to his mouth a hand pressed soft against his belly, and Sherlock'll murmur in the dark, "Good night, John."

_I wrote an __ode to Sherlock's name/a last week, it seemed only right I write one for John's. I know this is about the good doctor however, than about the prayer Sherlock's made of those four simple letters._


	17. In the Dark

**In the Dark**

Sometimes they make love in the dark.

In nearly every room of 221B streetlight washes pale through sheer curtains, but the upstairs bedroom faces away from Baker and in that room remain the heavy drapes left behind two tenants ago.

So sometimes, just sometimes, they go to that rare-used room and they draw those dusty old drapes against the night. The room falls quickly quiet and so very dark.

"Here," Sherlock whispers, reaching for a hand he can't see. After a moment short fingers dance across the back of his wrist—the _other_ one—and he jumps.

_Surprise._

John thinks that's why they do this: When Sherlock can't see, his reactions, his brain, hell, his damn _breathing_—they slow down. And the great consulting detective becomes for a little while merely—mercifully—mortal.

And isn't that a relief?

_Sometimes._

In that dark John always grows silent, keen to heighten the suspense, keep his lover guessing. He's rewarded with quickly indrawn breaths, murmurs of surprise, tiny twitches of startlement.

Most times they'll take their time, leisurely rediscovering the breadth of each other's shoulders, the length of leg. They'll run fingertips soft along collarbones or over spine, and while they do they'll listen close for small sighs, breathy groans.

What they won't do at first is touch one another…_there._ It's the unspoken rule, the only one.

_At first_ lasts a long time. Until it doesn't.

"Here," Sherlock eventually whispers, reaching for fingers dancing along his ribs or his jaw. He places John's hand between his legs and John grins at the erection there. Damned if it isn't something like a surprise, a gift, every time.

As he tugs Sherlock's pants down John usually starts talking again. "Here," he'll murmur against his sweetheart's mouth. "Right here, always here."

_Kuuttamo's gorgeous art is again what prompted the words—Google: kuuttamo sometimes sherlock tumblr. Then see what I mean. Good lord who _wouldn't_ be inspired?_


	18. Pox

**Pox**

"No…there…almost…you're…right there. No, no ove—yes! _Oh god John, yes!"_

Sherlock gently banged his forehead against the fireplace mantle in bliss. Then got bossy again.

"Now go down."

John didn't go down.

"_Please_ John."

John didn't.

"I'll clean out the refrigerator let you read in peace tell Mrs. Hudson I accidentally put laxative in those scones and walk naked through Regent's if you'll _just._ _go. down."_

John shouldn't have done what he _already_ did, much less go down, but the fridge _and_ some quiet reading?

"Today? You'll do them today?"

Sherlock moaned, spread his legs wide so he was John-height, gripped the mantle hard enough to crack knuckles. "Yes, John," he whispered, "_please."_

John's a doctor. He knows better. _He really does know better._ But he also knows how eye-rollingly good it feels when—

"Now," Sherlock begged, "Oh god n—"

Fuck it. John firmed his stance, squared his shoulders, and dug the nails of both hands into a spot between Sherlock's shoulder blades. Then he god damn _scratched._ Long. And hard.

The sounds Sherlock made were not human. Possibly not even possible. And more than a little arousing.

By the time John was done, Sherlock was pretty much dead with relief, slumped boneless on the floor in front of the fire, scratching his belly and babbling happily to himself.

John looked down at his pajama-clad love. No way was the fridge getting cleaned today. And there'd probably be no apology to Mrs. Hudson.

There could, however, be other things.

John curled up on the floor beside his sweetheart, manacled Sherlock's wrists in one hand, took over scratching his lover's chicken pox with the other. It took awhile, but eventually things proceeded nicely from there.

And this time John went down—so to speak—quite willingly.

_The wonderfully gifted Roquentine had a recent bout with the itchy-scratchies. A little porn lotion for your pains, my dear?_


	19. Crave

**Crave**

There are three things Sherlock Holmes craves above all others.

* A case

* Tobacco

* John

Of these there is one he wants to the point of distraction. There's one he'll never give up. And there's one for which he'd die.

Everyone knows which is which. The new neighbors two doors down. The postman. The teller at the local bank. Whether they know him as Mr. Holmes, as Sherlock, or simply as sir, everyone damn well knows.

"Don't."

John knows, too. Of course he does.

"Not again."

Sherlock's first case came when he was nine. He deduced where father had hidden mother's cigarettes. Her thanks—a trip to London—had been all the positive reinforcement the bright boy needed.

"You can't do it again, so stop."

Sherlock had his first cigarette at fourteen, 'borrowing' one from mother. He knew she knew but as one fiendishly bright addict to another she understood the need.

"They won't let you, and I don't need it."

Sherlock's first realization that John was different, vital, rare, there'd been a woman in pink grown cool between them and it felt like the words _brilliant, amazing, _and _incredible _were pressed against his skin.

"There's no cancer, Sherlock. The tests came back negative. You know this. I don't need your blood again." John held out a steady, wrinkled hand. "You know what I need. Especially today."

Of the few things Sherlock craves above all others there's only one he wants to the point of distraction, will never give up, and for whom he'd die.

And everyone knows.

Of course they do.

Sherlock stepped into his husband's arms, pressed a kiss to his warm neck. "Happy seventy-first birthday, John."

_The wonderfully gifted __xxxxxx6x__ created a beautiful image—"As Time Goes By"—of retired John and Sherlock, and that inspired this. (Google: xxxxxx6x as time goes by)_


	20. School Reunion

**School Reunion**

"It's fine Sherlock."

Sherlock figleafed his crotch, glared at the photographer.

"I'm a touch underdressed."

John took his husband's arm, smiling over at old Dr. Benson. He'd always hated Benson.

"You look ravishing my pet."

Despite Sherlock's formidable glower the photographer kept snapping photos. Sherlock wondered if he gave off a slightly less intimidating vibe wearing little other than fishnets and heels.

"You could have told me it was formal dress."

John grinned when Benson, still staring, walked into a drinks cart.

"You hate tuxedos. And I knew you were busy with the club case. This was easier, wasn't it?"

John scoped out the room. Where was Matthews?

John's encouragement that he simply come straight from the strip club had, indeed, ensured Sherlock would attend his husband's 'little event.'

"You might have mentioned it was your medical school reunion. I'd've 'cleaned up nice,' as you say."

_Where was she?_ John would stand here grinning and nodding until he was dead, or until Matthews saw them, whichever came first.

"Since when are you shy, my darling?"

Sherlock shifted on spiny stilettos. At least he was wearing _something_ moderately appropriate.

"I'm not _shy _John, but the room's a bit chilly and I'm not showing to advantage."

_Ha! There she was!_

John turned to his husband with a mischievous grin. "Well darling, I think I can fix that."

John whispered sexy things into his husband's ear awhile, and though the good doctor's voice remained soft, eventually _other _things did not.

Minutes later Sherlock stood tall, extended a black-lacquered hand. "Dr. Matthews, my husband's told me _all_ about you."

Victoria Matthews had unceremoniously dumped John during their residency, claiming he just hadn't been her type.

Matthews winched up her jaw with some effort. Well it sure as hell looked like she hadn't been _his_ type either.

_The amazing LadyGrinningSouls drew a very cracky image (Google: ladygrinningsouls pssst atlin) without knowing the story behind it. I think the story went something like this._


	21. Splints

**Splints**

"Don't be ridiculous, John."

The good doctor looked out the sitting room window, silent. He didn't want to argue.

"You were perfectly fine yesterday."

John pushed the curtain open with his wrist. Well, with the splint on his wrist.

"You _weren't_ fine yesterday."

John winced at a twinge. It wasn't pain exactly, he wouldn't call it that. It was just a lingering ache, something that made him stop, rub his wrists, move on.

"It's nothing, love. A little overuse injury. Leave it."

Sherlock doesn't do a whole lot of things any more, things he was peacock-strutting proud of before. _Watch me go for days without food, sleep, comfort…_

_(…a human touch, warmth, peace.)_

The good detective stood behind his lover, gently cupped a splinted wrist in each big hand.

He doesn't do so many things any more because they were idiotic things that hadn't made him strong, but riddled him with cracks and fissures, turned him foul-mouthed and short-tempered…

"You_ idiot."_

…so when John does it, does what he used to do, hiding hurt, pushing through pain, well Sherlock wants to shake him, shout, demand—_take more care of this man I love._

"My ridiculous little hero. My tiny, terrible love." (He's not always good at the endearments, Mr. Sherlock Holmes.)

They both saw John's lop-sided grin reflected in rain-splattered glass. (He's a sucker for these strange, scatter-shot sentiments, is Dr. John Watson.)

"The crime's gone as lackluster as this blasted sky. We'll go to the south of France. I'll wine you, dine you. Buy you a tiny red swimsuit, then strip it off under a ramshackle pier."

John's grin grew, and Sherlock's hands held more gently still.

They didn't end up going to France. But John did get that swimsuit. And all the rest. And more. So very much more.

_This is for the lovely a Purrculier1 and her achy self. I hope this wee fic dulls the pain just a bit, my dear._


	22. Lyrical

**Lyrical**

Sherlock Holmes isn't an emotional man.

The detective in him needs to understand why, how much, and when. Feelings, slippery things, are notoriously difficult to quantify.

Sherlock Holmes isn't a lyrical man.

The scientist in him requires precise words, clipped and clear, definitive phrases that leave no room for interpretation or shades of grey.

Sherlock Holmes isn't a lover.

The human being in him has learned many things over many years: Being smart gets you hurt. Speaking your mind loses you friends. Seeing what others don't makes you a freak. Of what benefit is love?

John Hamish Watson puts lie to everything Sherlock Holmes thinks he's not.

Not once, not twice, not three or four or five times but more times than Sherlock can count John's stepped between him and a gun, a fist, a shout. He's offered to die so Sherlock can live.

With world-weary eyes and crossed arms he somehow manages to say, "You went about this all wrong but yes, now I see what you see and I agree, you're right, they're wrong and you're right."

Every day they're together, John listens to him, looks to him, understands and respects him. He guides, teaches, and most of all takes—no, _wants—_the things Sherlock knows how to give.

"Even before all of this, before the long nights and bright days, before the chaos and the cases and the clues…before all of the things we've done and been and seen together, I knew. How could I not? It's all there on your face. The patience, the wisdom. The certainty and strength. Even before you loved me John, believe this: I loved you."

Sherlock Holmes is an emotional man.

A lyrical man.

And John's lover.

_AnnaCarrota's beautiful drawing was the inspiration for this wee fic (Google: annacarrota beautiful john atlinmerrick). His eyes, lord oh lord, I love his eyes._


	23. Legends

**Legends**

People will talk. They sometimes do little else.

People talking is what's made the Baker Street boys legends in their own lifetime. And of the tales told about these men, well some are tall, and some are true.

About John Watson they say many things. That he's mighty and he's strong. They say he's a warrior, fierce and brave. They also say he's a marvelous cook and hung like a horse and frankly John'll tell you some fictions are best left as fact.

It's about Sherlock Holmes that the myths veer most from truth, though there's plenty of that to go around.

Sherlock _is_ haughty and high-handed. He's also imperious and arrogant and vain. He's pedantic and temperamental and treacherous, hell the man himself will tell you all that and more.

But he'll also tell you that sometimes when people talk, they fashion falsehood from fact.

The years when Sherlock doused the fire in his head with needles and narcotics, with razors pressed sharp against delicate skin? That time was long before John and so no, the good doctor never bore the burden of Sherlock's nightmares, his self-crippling, his pain.

People talk and they talk…yet somehow even in legend you can find seeds of truth.

Yes Sherlock Holmes must be cosseted and admired, his ego stroked and his brilliance seen. But here's a truth straight from John Watson's mouth: There will never be a man this man's equal, and for every flaw there are a dozen grace notes unseen.

Finally, here's the truest thing, the thing those talkative people always get right: That small doctor who used to have nightmares and who once imagined himself lame? In his brash and unquiet way Sherlock loves him to distraction, will always love him, this fierce man, this brave man…this legend.

_Coeykuhn gorgeous artwork (Google: Coeykuhn cocaine) made me think of all the falsehoods that'd rise up about John and Sherlock through the years, how timelines would get skewed, and untruths repeated. But people wouldn't get _everything_ wrong…_


	24. Baker Street

**Baker Street**

It's rarely quiet on Baker Street.

Lord's Cricket Ground is not far up the road from 221B, so taxis are forever heading toward or coming from. There's a tube station nearby, and one of the prettiest parks in London across the street. There's Madame Tussaud's and the music college and pubs and so it's hardly ever quiet on Baker, from morning until midnight crowds cluster along its wide boulevard, raucous and busy, frenetic and loud.

But _sometimes_ it's silent, and John and Sherlock are among the few who know just when.

Because crime doesn't keep a clock, the boys are as likely to return from the Yard at three a.m. as at noon. And it's on those dawn-pale mornings, when wrens are greeting the soft light, that they'll sometimes fall into bed, pull the duvet high, and stay awake to bathe themselves in the rare silence…and then in sweet, small noises.

Sherlock will lose himself for long minutes in the staticky hiss of his fingertips running over the fine blond hair on John's arms. John'll drag nails soft along Sherlock's bare belly, certain he can hear the infinitesimal sound of goosebumps rising. Or they may just lay side-by-side, nearly nose-to-nose, and simply breathe together.

Some half-past-four mornings they'll whisper about the case just done; listen to the splash of rain; or peer out the bedroom window, deducing the dawn creatures they find there.

Then there are the hushed hours before sunrise when the only sounds they listen for are their own sighs, soft moans, and the rustle of the duvet as they wrap tight around each other, their own little island, their own quiet noise.

_Every time I see this lovely drawing by Lyd-T (Google: detectivelyd still point) it makes me want to stop…go slow…and just breathe._


	25. Speaker for the Dead

**Speaker for the Dead**

He speaks for the dead, because the dead speak to him.

It's not the note clutched in a murdered MP's fist that tells Sherlock who did it, it's the necklace latched crooked round her neck that gives up the name of her killer.

It's not a teary confession in court that clears up just who stabbed the old bed-bound witness, it's the silent daughter sat transfixed in courtroom shadows that catches and hold those light, all-seeing eyes.

Sherlock doesn't truck with ghosts or ghouls, there's nothing mystical about how he knows what he knows, sees the things he sees. So how, exactly, does he do it?

Well that's obvious, if you look at him. No, really look. Do you see?

Those spidery fingers and absurdly long toes? The reedy arms and ceaseless leg? That wild cacophony of hair pointing in every cardinal direction?

Do you see? Do you?

Sherlock Holmes is six feet of damn _antenna_ for heaven's sake, every inch of that rangy frame is fine-tuned to _receive._

And receive he does, with eyes, ears, nose, tongue, and touch he absorbs fact, supposition, rumor, and lie. He sifts, collates, and then faster than you blink he deduces, quicker than you guess he _knows._

Why did a brilliant woman swallow a bitter pill, how did the perpetrator escape a locked room, where are the jewels, the will, the weapon, the proof?

Sherlock knows. Sometimes it takes him hours, sometimes days, rarely weeks, but in the end he knows because those bodies grown forever still? They tell him. They whisper it, or shout, but in the end they give their secrets up.

Sherlock Holmes can't but help but speak for the dead, because for every day of his long life, the dead will speak to him.

_You see how Ben plays him: Sherlock enters a room, fingers unfurling, chin lifting to scent, body spinning. Every inch of Sherlock collects, senses, sees. It's beautiful._


	26. Deduce Your Sins

**Deduce Your Sins**

Soft as a prayer: "Motherfucking fuck."

Sherlock untucked his head from John's neck, blink-squinted at the dawn. "John Watson," he sleepily slurred, "I w's havin' a good dream."

Tugging the duvet to his chin John Watson "Shhhhhhed," very hard. If shushing can sound annoyed, penitent, and aggrieved this shushing did.

Sherlock retucked his head, rubbed his face against a doctorly neck, murmured, "Y'had a dream, too."

_"Shhhhh,"_ hiss-whispered an annoyed, penitent, aggrieved man, in no mood to be—

"Shall I deduce your sins?"

Loud and clear: "God _damn_ it."

Sherlock brushed sleep-warm finger against John's lips. "Your swearing's foul for so early in the morning, you feel either penitent, aggrieved, or annoyed about the dream's content."

John may have muttered _motherfucking fuck_ under his breath again.

Sherlock softly bit beside John's Adam's apple. "Your heart rate's spiked at least thirty percent. The dream was intense."

John tried growling his pulse lower. Didn't work.

Sherlock's palm snaked down to John's chest. "You're sweating despite the cold. You were passionate about something."

John shivered prettily.

Sherlock's long fingers slithered lower still. "And the last time you were this divinely erect from a dream you and I were having carnal relations in a confessional."

Sherlock got to his knees.

"Don't touch it," John whispered, "It's profane."

Ignoring his lover's petition, Sherlock devilishly wriggled beneath their warm cathedral of covers.

And began speaking in tongues.

_This is not what I expected to write when looking at Kuuttamo's gorgeous priest!Sherlock (Google: Kuuttamo confessions deduce), but then you never do. This is a wee sequel to my story "Sacrilege," __which featured father Sherlock, brother John, and a very Tardis-like confessional._


	27. Crash

**Crash**

"I'm all right."

Sherlock said nothing. John could practically hear his lover's pulse double over the mobile's static anyway.

"The driver's fine, I'm fine, the cab is even mostly fine."

Sherlock said nothing. Through the phone line John could hear him deducing exactly which words were a lie anyway.

"I'm just going to get a quick check-up and then be right there."

John didn't say the words A&E, exam, or "rule out a concussion" but he could hear Sherlock hearing them anyway.

"It's all right love, really, I'm fine. Breathe. Just sit down, put your head between your knees if you have to. Breathe."

John didn't make a joke to lighten the tension because he knew the only thing Sherlock needed now was the steady, careful sound of his voice.

"And no, the driver isn't an idiot and no I won't tell you his name. He was swerving to miss a tourist who looked left instead of right and just walked in front of his car. It was either hit her or hit the cab."

In the morgue at St. Bart's, one gloved hand resting on the powder-pale ankle of some minor royal, Sherlock counted his heart beats.

"I'm all right, I mean it."

Sherlock closed his eyes and realized he'd lost count.

"Are you, my love?"

Sherlock jerked his hand from the corpse. Stripped off the glove, dropped it to the floor.

"All right, just sit tight. I'll be there soon."

Sherlock was halfway toward the door.

"Please be there for me."

Sherlock stopped.

"I need you to be there, love."

Sherlock started counting again. Nodded. _Yes John. Yes John. Yes John._

"I love you too, Sherlock."

_Thank you so much to SherlockedArt for her beautiful "Nearly Kissing" image (Google: SherlockedArt all right Sherlock). Also, this wee fic is for the crazy-gifted Kirakira-Nanoda who was in a car accident recently...sorry there's no sexy-times, dear one, but sometimes they say I love you in other ways. So glad you're okay!_


	28. Victorian

**Victorian**

Lush. Lavish. Ornate. Damn well _Victorian._

If pressed, that's how John describes Sherlock. There's such an abundance of the decorative to the man—arse, eyes, hair, lips—that surely he's the very embodiment of that fussy esthetic.

Even Sherlock's 'enemies' give him that. Sort of.

"If that ornamental idiot doesn't clear out of my crime scene, so help me…" grouses Anderson.

"And tell your pretty little boytoy I've had just about enough of him for today…" threatens Donovan.

Since he was old enough to hear, to doubt, and then to demean, someone, somewhere has been telling Sherlock he's gorgeous.

It wasn't until their second month as lovers that John finally understood the obvious. Not only does Sherlock believe these people lie, he desperately fears they _don't._

Because if he's as pretty as all that…what happens the day he's suddenly not?

Cue the brilliant John Watson, and the beginning of a life-long habit.

John insults Sherlock.

"Your breath could kill a corpse," he'll say some mornings, but then lean in to kiss his dozy love on the mouth. With tongue. Twice.

"You could lodge a hive of bees in that knotted mop," he'll grumble, and then lift that messy hair from the back of Sherlock's neck and nibble sweetly.

"Your eye bags have bags you know; you look like shit," he'll pronounce, then tug Sherlock onto the sofa and stroke his forehead until they both fall asleep.

And so it goes, for months, for years, for a life.

John tells the beautiful man that sometimes he emphatically isn't. And that it's just fine.

"I love what you look like, but I don't give a flying fuck what you look like. Your beauty makes me hard, it gets me _wet,_ but the most gorgeous thing about you isn't here, or here, or here—" John's fingers drift over a face, a cock, an arse. "—it's right here. Endless, and beautiful. Indomitable, and mine."

And John rests his hand over Sherlock's strong, swift-beating heart.

_I think Sherlock, like the man who plays him, is conflicted by his looks. The world tells him he's beautiful, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't believe them. And if he does…what then? What happens to the praise when the beauty fades? (*Ahem* Me? Emotionally invested?) To see an example of incredibly lush Sherlock by Euclase, Google: Sherlock atlinmerrick Victorian._


	29. Vengeance

**Vengeance**

_Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord…_

Sherlock's not a man of faith, he doesn't call on god, he does not pray. Sherlock's not a man to touch, laying hands on strangers, cyphers, fools.

But, as in all things, for John Sherlock makes exceptions.

He was a hundred metres away when he spotted his angry little love marching down Park Road, unaware Sherlock followed. And follow Sherlock would, until the set of those shoulders softened, until that stride turned again to swagger. Sherlock would follow, and wait, and then he'd—

He was just a hundred metres away when it happened. A hundred metres, which, it turns out, is exactly far enough for…

Two young men to drift up to John like smoke and shadow.

It's exactly far enough for…

Those men to touch John.

It's so far, too far, far enough away for…

A man who's already running to hear those boys call John queer, fairy, faggot.

A hundred metres is quite far enough for a man who has no faith to call on the divine, to pray and pray, in a single breathless chant, "Oh god please…"

And a hundred metres is enough, more than enough—why you'd need much, much less really—to build in that man a rage so blind that when he's there, finally there, Sherlock _rends._ He _tears._

In the end both of those boys needed stitches, in the end one of them was so badly battered he was hospitalized with a concussion, dislocated shoulder, multiple contusions.

But the only thing Sherlock regretted, despite the court case later, despite the fractures in three of his own fingers, was the small scar John had after, invisible unless you knew where to look, right there, at the very edge of his brow.

It's years since that afternoon, but now and again Sherlock brushes at the tiny scar with the pad of his thumb, and he kisses that place warm.

_Well, this is a very, um, _aggressive _thank you to The Science of Johnlock, who wonderfully dedicated a whole day of her blog to me. When I asked what wee fic I could write for her she requested BAMF!Sherlock. Apparently I heard very-extremely-BAMF!Sherlock._


	30. I Will Wait

**I Will Wait**

So often John waits.

As a boy, once the other boys grew tall and ran ahead, he'd wait for them to return. They usually did.

As a doctor, he'd run tests, prescribe pills, perform surgeries, and then, with each and every patient, he'd patiently wait and see.

As a soldier, he learned war is about waiting, its drama happening in the slowest of motions over months, years.

So often John Watson waits, and so he's damn good at it, he's quite fine at staying still and silent. He knows how to hope, he knows how to pray.

Then there was Sherlock. And everything changed.

The first lesson came the night Sherlock leapt across two rooftop and John learned he could live a heart-thrumming lifetime through the seconds it took Sherlock to reach safety on the other side.

The second came the morning John offered an opinion at a crime scene and turned Sherlock from a clue that mattered to one that didn't. A second victim nearly died and now the good doctor stays silent, waiting to be of use.

The third lesson came those first weeks they were lovers when they both learned that for Sherlock sex is about temptation and tease, it's about _pushing_ in and waiting, about _pulling_ out and then…and then…and then…_oh god yes!_

The fourth lesson John's still learning, and despite intensive study this is one he'll never learn—and never wants to. John will never learn how to live without this man he's lived half a lifetime not knowing.

So John'll never wait patiently on a train platform when the one arriving on that train is his lover.

John will never wait with grace when a doctor's busy patching one of Sherlock's many wounds.

And John'll never _wait_ while some 'wit' tries to cut Sherlock down with insults or invective.

So often John waits, and so many times he doesn't, but in learning when he can and emphatically when he can't, John's learned this: Sherlock Holmes? This brilliant detective, this good man, this kind and gentle lover? He's worth that wait, however long and however hard it may be.

John Watson waited half a lifetime to find Sherlock. He'll gladly wait the rest of it, now that he's found him.

_A beautiful drawing of John's beautiful, patient eyes was drawn by ThePastelMonster (Google: ThePastelMonster new technique — it'll be the fourth link) inspired this. P.S. I've just spent a week traveling, first hundreds, then thousands of miles, so I've missed publishing a big piece. I'm doing my best to get back on schedule, in the meantime thank you kindly for…waiting. _


	31. Sometimes They Hurry

**Sometimes They Hurry**

Sometimes they hurry.

Sometimes they just don't want to take the damn _time._ Time to fiddle with _buttons,_ time to fuss with the pulling and the taking _off._

Sometimes it's just damn well _urgent._

The need, the need, the need…sometimes it's so great that now is not soon enough and don't think they haven't wondered why. After all, they're full-grown men and frankly they've had one another in most ways it's possible to be had. And yet…

And yet sometimes the want is nearly overwhelming and they'll be in the middle of shucking off shoes, pulling off socks, and one of them will moan or growl or make some other wordless noise that says, _stop stop stop this_ _so that we can _start.

And it's those times—it's almost always before they're leaving or just after they've come home—when they'll give up on the shirts and the pants and they'll fall on the bed with trousers barely shoved down, but oh yes they're plenty low enough, low enough so that soon one of them's groaning at the so-fine feeling of being entered, and the other is whispering a litany that goes something like, "Oh god, oh god…"

The resulting sex is…sumptuous, for lack of a better term, it's fast enough to raise goosebumps but slow enough that each time one sinks into the other they both feel it from clenched teeth to curled toes.

There's as likely to be giggles as groans as the passion takes hold, or suddenly someone's ticklish, or god-forbid sneezes—forcing an erection unceremoniously _out—_but eventually they settle into a rhythm, fists wrapping round biceps and cocks, and the urgency colours it all, underlines, caps, italicizes every murmur, each stroke, until at last someone's yelling and then so's the other and good god there's come all over everything and two pairs of trousers that need to go straight into the wash, and then…and then as often as not there's words, a few, and a dozy nap amidst the wreckage, and maybe an early dinner after.

Neither can say why there's this rare desperation, but the answer's not really so obscure. It's because _they_ are rare. Because along with bodies that puzzle-piece together just right, by some miracle their souls fit too, each man's edges the opposite of the other's and yet when they're pressed close like this they fit precisely, two halves that make something far greater than one whole.

Sometimes John and Sherlock hurry, they hurry, they _hurry._

Most times they don't.

_Sometimes you look at artwork and the story is just there. You may ignore it—god knows why—but this being Tumblr you'll see that artwork again, and again there's the story. And so it went with __DoubleNegativeMeansYes' lovely art (Google: DoubleNegativeMeansYes b-day). I saw desperation, urgency, two souls feeling the same thing at the same time. P.S. __The wonderful Jesperanda has podficced this story, you can find two readings on my Tumblr (Google: atlinmerrick sometimes they hurry. Links at the bottom)._


	32. Rush

**Rush**

Sherlock Holmes isn't a patient man.

He hurries from a crime scene even when he knows the only goal is giving a statement at the Met. He'll fly out the Met's double doors, though his destination is simply the coffee shop at the corner. He runs up 221B's stairs even when all that's waiting is a chilly flat and the morning's cold tea.

As if the clock's ever ticking, Sherlock rushes and runs, then bosses, cajoles, harasses everyone when he gets there—_While I'm still young. Talk faster. Move, quicker, now, now, _now!

For the longest time Sherlock didn't _take_ time, even when that was all he had. And then Sherlock Holmes made love to John Watson and one small bit of everything changed.

Because, though he's still easily distracted by the bauble of a new case, a clue, a witness' lie, flying off like a magpie after shiny things, in bed Sherlock rarely rushes, and the finest gem is the rare one in his hands: A doctor, a soldier, a saint (he's pretty sure), _John._

"Slow," he'll whisper soft against the nape of his lover's neck, pressing his hips down so John can't push up. "Slower," he'll groan, body heavy against John's back. "Still," he'll murmur and for long seconds, sometimes minutes, they'll remain unmoving, though they're a rush of blood and hormone and need.

And then, even when they again start moving, so often the motions are languorous, the words are whispers, and the moans just barely breath. Because here Sherlock's finally learned to take time, all the time they need, and sometimes even more than that.

He still rushes from one place to the next, from one _sentence_ to the next, but at least now Sherlock understands that some moments can stand still and that with John, touching John, breathing John, _loving_ John…he so very much wants them to.

_Thank you Quirkygirl22 for asking for the 'flip side' of last week's "I Will Wait," my wee ode about how very good John is at waiting. DecompositionDance's lovely artwork suits this story so well (Google: DecompositionDance someone blame). P.S. Changing my publishing schedule a bit: Small fics like this on Monday (instead of Thursday), long stories on Thursday (instead of Monday). Thank you._


	33. Tickle

**Tickle**

There's a particular kind of tickling John loves.

But first let's be clear about something: John fucking hates tickling. Oh he's partial to digging strong fingers into the sweet xylophone of his lover's ribs, but the good doctor's not keen on getting what he gives. Do not tickle John Watson.

_However. _

There's a certain sort of tickling John's addicted to, a delicate, sweet kind he didn't even know before Sherlock.

Here's how it goes…

Sherlock will do what Sherlock always does: he'll _tease._ He'll take John's body (and oh yes, sometimes Sherlock _takes_ John's sweaty little body), and he'll bring him to the absolute edge. Sherlock will then toy with John there, tempting and tormenting, taking so long and doing so little that by the time John comes, every nerve ending's on god damn _fire._

Then sometimes, just sometimes, it happens: John goes heart-poundingly ticklish _there._

They discovered it because Sherlock's damned oral, and though John had just come in his mouth, Sherlock was hungry for more, and so, after five, ten, fifteen seconds of stillness as John came down from coming, Sherlock started moving again, sliding that pretty, pretty mouth up John's still-hard shaft and then back down again.

That's when it happened: John's back arched hard and high and he _giggled._

You've heard that giggle, you know its charms. Well now take that, double it, add come and cocks, and you have an addictive recipe for a weekend of sex, sex, and more sex as Sherlock probed the parameters of this new brand of tickling.

And probe he did, with tongue and fingers, he experimented both back and front, he topped, he tailed, he tried _everything._ Yet it only happened that once. Until it happened again, four months later, then six weeks after that, then not for another year.

It remains a mystery why John'll go ticklish down below, and though Sherlock's passionate about mysteries, this one he's quite content to _probe_ endlessly…yet leave unsolved.

_There's an artwork I visualize with this, and in it I can just hear John's giggle in a few moments, as Sherlock slides dooooown… Go see it! (Google: AnnaCarrota lovely new follower). This was written for Tamara M., who asked for John and Sherlock in a tickle fight. Well it's not quite a fight, um, but it is tickling…_


	34. Right and Wrong

**Right and Wrong**

Sherlock knows it's wrong, he recognizes his desires are selfish, he's pretty sure he should say nothing, that that's what John would do and he wants to be more like John sometimes, just sometimes, he wants to be more like John _for_ John but he's not sure he can do it, he's not sure he can keep his big mouth shut about this and yes he's got a great big mouth in pretty much every way you can and he knows it and the idea of keeping it shut is an idea he's had maybe twice in his life so he's not _good_ at it and frankly he doesn't want to be and—

Sherlock claps the laptop closed, shoves it across the desk, paces the sitting room, paces and paces and thinks and thinks one thing.

_Don't go._

It's what he's not supposed to say when John comes home. That's the thing he knows is right. Don't be codependent and demanding and needy. Don't prevent John from doing what John wants to do. Be _good_ Sherlock. Can you? A little? Can you even _try?_

_Don't go._

Every Christmas this is Sherlock's fear: That John will go…somewhere. He has distant family here and there. He doesn't talk about them much but he's got the guilt most people do, about seeing them, about being 'responsible.'

_Don't go._

And Sherlock wasn't snooping (for once), he needs that email from their client but instead of email there it is, John's browser opened to British Airways' flights and…

"Hello, sleeping beauty."

Sherlock blinks up from the sofa, amazed he actually fell asleep. Slowly he curls his body into a tight ball meant to keep in words, all the words, all the stupid stupid…

"I'm not going anywhere," John says, because he's an observant man too, he realizes he left his laptop open, that his beautiful fool made a foolish deduction.

John's pretty sure it's wrong, wrong to ignore the far-flung family he's never much liked. He's pretty sure he should go see them, but he doesn't, he hasn't, he won't. Every holiday he looks at airfares and every holiday it makes him flee the flat and walk around until he gets a handle on things. On _this._

John crawls onto the sofa, onto Sherlock.

_This._ This is not wrong, this not selfish.

Limbs open, wrap, hold tight.

This? This here, between just these two?

_This_ is right, they are right.

_They_ are family.

_The artwork is from the still-missed SherlockedArt. The story was inspired when Oxygen-Thief kindly sent me an airport image prompt for my Advent fics, then lovely Tracionn sent me a suite of sweet cuddling images, and instead Advent turned into wee Tumblr fic and here we are._


	35. Starshine

**Starshine**

Sherlock growled and _stabbed._

John pretended not to notice.

Five minutes later Sherlock bludgeoned harder, gritting teeth so vigorously the good doctor heard it.

All right, that was enough.

Stopping dead in the middle of night-empty Westminster bridge John said, "You've got something in your hair love."

Sherlock ceased jabbing his mobile keypad, stopped, glanced at John, then bowed his head. Long seconds passed; nothing happened. John did not reach up to remove whatever offensive object occupied Sherlock's locks.

The consulting detective detected something afoot. He scowled, fidgeted, was about to hold forth when John cupped his jaw, brushed dark fringe from his eyes and said, "Oh, my mistake, it's just starshine."

The good detective stilled, suddenly docile as a kitten.

"Yes, these few threads of white in all this fine dark…just starshine trapped in your pretty hair. And look…" John ran thumbs along the crow's feet coming along nicely at the corners of Sherlock's eyes. "…you've managed to capture some joy here, and right here." Thumbs gentled Sherlock's eyelids closed. "These, though, would benefit from glasses if only to save your poor mobile's keypad and Greg the heart failure he gets from the more salacious autocorrects you fail to catch."

Sherlock didn't much care what the world thought of him, not about most things, but he was finding he cares, too much, about the whole tiresome ageing thing. He's emphatically not a fan.

His thirty-sixth birthday was more than a week gone and he can't forget that there are now five strands of grey in his hair, a starburst of wrinkles at the corner of each eye, and the less said about his developing short-sightedness the better.

Oh, but John had plenty to say about all of this and more. "Age cannot wither him," he whispered, "nor custom stale his infinite variety. Others cloy the appetites they feed, but he…" John stood on tiptoe, kissed Sherlock's mouth soft as starlight. "…he makes hungry where most he satisfies."

Sherlock will not go easy into the good night of getting older, but he knows he'll go there with John Watson and that—along with some glasses, apparently—is all he'll ever truly need.

_I wanted to write a birthday fic for Sherlock at the request of a reader (I forgot who asked, so sorry!) but didn't have time. So on the day of my own birth, I finally made time. I know I say this often, but I am so in love with these characters I can't even tell you. Please go see SiljaVich's beautiful starshine Sherlock—Google: SiljaVich deviantart sherly—which helped inspire this, then please tell her what you think. Thank you!_


	36. 7,094,514,678

**7,094,514,678**

_Four_

The number of homicides last year in the London borough of Westminster, of which 221B Baker is part.

_88,740_

The total square miles comprising Great Britain, which includes England, Scotland, and Wales.

_1 in 7,094,514,678_

The number of John Hamish Watsons contained within the entire earth's population.

...

Sherlock Holmes doesn't believe in luck. He doesn't believe in fate, favour, karma, or any of the other unscientific concepts people employ for making sense of fortunes both good and ill.

_But…_

Seven billion, ninety four million, five hundred and fourteen thousand, six hundred and seventy eight.

What are the chances that a very singular consulting detective, mean-mouthed and prickly, brilliant and vain, should meet one man hidden in so many? What are the chances that in a population so vast there would be a doctor, a soldier, a _friend_ who, over time would _take_ the time to help Sherlock, teach him, to _love him?_

What are the chances that this small man would need Sherlock's big hands to soothe away nightmares? That between short wriggly toes long fingers would perfectly fit?

What are the chances that the two of them would build a life together, watch telly, drink tea, talk long of thing petty and profound?

What are the chances that in a world of seven billion human beings Sherlock should meet John and in each other they would find contentment and peace, passion and love?

What are the chances?

_One in one_

For though Sherlock Holmes doesn't believe in fate or karma or luck or even prayer, he with all his heart believes this: There is no time, no world, no place in which he would not have met John Watson. Without even knowing they were looking, Sherlock knows they would have found each other.

No matter when or where or how…_they would have found each other._

_Doublenegativemeansyes' artwork helped inspire this (Google: Doublenegativemeansyes s-john-j). And yes, at the time of writing all figures were correct!_


	37. The Freight Train and the Wall

**The Freight Train and the Wall**

Sometimes John holds Sherlock down.

You might think it's a small man struggling for dominance.

You might think it's a big man craving submission.

What you think is wrong.

Because here's the thing: The problem with being strong is that it makes you disinclined to ask for help. Put down burdens. Take a damn _breath._

Sherlock's been strong in body and mind for a long time. Before others asked the world of him, he asked it of himself, only his standards were higher, his demands fiercer, his tolerance of failure non-existent.

Before Sherlock learned how to defame a lying witness, a suspect, the idiot who took his cab, he perfected the fine art of savaging _himself_ every time he missed a clue, misunderstood a joke, or simply thought too slowly.

Brain and body a freight train forever gathering speed, Sherlock never stopped, did not stop, _could not stop…_

And then he met a wall.

Know this: Sherlock didn't know he wanted to stop, hadn't a clue. Then one day John held him down and instead of struggling, Sherlock went motionless, keened, almost _cried._

Because where Sherlock is all relentless speed, John is still. He's silent, slow and, most importantly, now that he has a reason, a person, a _purpose,_ John's at peace.

And so when John presses his sweetheart into the sheets with the wall of his weight and will and love and every single atom of god damn peace he has in him, well something amazing happens, something sweet.

Sherlock's body arches into the contact, his eyes close, and after one second, two…he stutters himself still.

Sherlock _stops._

Body.

Soul.

Brain.

Until it's just his heart gathering speed.

_Detectivelyd's beautiful "To the Sheets" artwork __inspired this. Every time I look at it I see relief on Sherlock's face, I see peace. (Find it here: tinyrul dot com /detectivelyd)_


	38. Utter Abandon

**Utter Abandon**

Sometimes they give in.

It can be almost anywhere, anytime, but always it's after what John thinks of as a redemption.

The absolution is never their own, it's always an innocent they've helped bring back from the brink—a kidnapped child, a tortured man, a battered woman.

It's these kinds of cases they both feel most keenly, the ones that come with such clear salvation, and afterward they're left with a rare moment, maybe two, where they stop, look at each other, and for long sweet seconds they see in one another _everything._ All of it. Each perfection.

_I will fight for you…_

_I will die for you…_

_And for all our lives together I will love you…_

And that's when their nerves jolt electric and their hearts trip much too fast and they just damn well give in.

It doesn't matter where they are or who's watching or what's being said, they reach for each other and they sink, submerge, fall so deep into a kiss that honest-to-god everything vanishes.

There's no police constable awaiting the rest of their statement. No cabbie asking where to. There's no one and nothing but this, just this, just _them._

And the never-fading realization that they saved each other, that however long they have together it'll be enough, and every moment they can feel this—the joy of the saving, of _knowing_ they've been saved—well damn it they best relish each one.

And so sometimes John and Sherlock give in, and they hold one another, and the world falls away, but people watch, they always do, and like a stone tossed into still water, John and Sherlock _ripple,_ their passion spreads wide, bringing to everyone it touches their own small bit of sweet redemption.

_I love the look of utter abandon a SH2JW gave to John and Sherlock in her artwork (Google: sh2jw and 26485044098). They're a million miles away from everything and the eye of their own perfect storm._


	39. Watching

**Watching**

Sherlock remembers his friends. He has, after all, so few. And though she asks him not to, he does it anyway, and always will: Sherlock puts flowers on the skull's grave.

Not often, no, because that's not in the way of Sherlocks. But once in awhile, when he's passing her cemetery, he'll go inside. As he walks along its well-tended paths, he steals a single fresh flower from a few dozen graves. When his pilfered bouquet is lavish enough and pretty, he'll head toward the far back of the graveyard and stand before a stone marked Aurora Aurelia Abbington.

The skull on the mantle was once a woman of forty-two, dark-haired and tall, with inquisitive eyes that saw too much and once, just once, not quite enough.

There are times when Sherlock wishes he'd known Rory before, but he's pretty sure he wouldn't have been kind, too familiar with the probing of therapists as a child to have been considerate to one as a man.

Still, he stands before her grave a few long moments in what passes for silence with him, eyes darting here and there, muttering about a current case, or the particulars of a baffling clue.

Back at the flat afterward, he'll swan around the sitting room, telling Rory about the recent arrivals to her final resting place, deducing this, that, and the other thing from the tokens loved ones leave beside the new headstones.

In return Rory tells him about a patient she had once who _also_ did this, that, and another thing besides, and before long she's veered onto one topic then another and Sherlock's stretched out on the sofa with her on his belly and by the time John comes home one of them's asleep and the other is watching, as she always does.

Because, though Sherlock has few friends, it's true, the ones he does have watch over him, even though he asks them not to, they do it anyway, and always will.

_Froggyk created some lovely artwork (Google: Froggyk white lily) and Rory is the name I've given the skull on the mantle at 221B (you may remember her from "Skullduggery.") You know the skull has a history, you know Sherlock would know that history. "I say friend…" The thing is, I think he really meant it._


	40. Canvas

**Canvas**

Sometimes Sherlock Holmes is a canvas, and John Watson an artist.

Some nights they're bone-weary from the day just passed, too tired for words but too keyed for sleep, and so they strip off and fall to the bed and for a long while they do nothing much. Then sometimes, as the dark settles into their bones, John grows restive, intent, needy.

It's those nights when the good doctor presses Sherlock to the sheets with broad, steady hands—_"Hush, don't move, it's all right"_—and John paints.

His canvas is all that fine, fair skin and, sitting cross-legged on the bed, he'll wonder that he doesn't mark this man every day because would you look? _Just absolutely look._

Here a chest splashed with freckles, a beautiful rag-tag trail begging to be strung together with the soft-hard press of a fingernail dragged red across tender skin. There, dark moles dotted throat to jaw, just waiting for a hot tongue to slick wet over warm flesh.

And then, and then, and _then_ the artist finds his inspiration as night-light catches the shadow of muscle in shoulders, the shift of tendons at neck, and the good doctor growls and then he _bites._

That's when his canvas comes alive, moving, moaning, going to hands and knees, presenting more, so much more of everything, skin and bone and freckle, and inspiration blazes bright in a small man who feverishly paints with sweat and spit and the soft suck of tiny bruises…

…until at last creator and creation merge, one sinking gratefully into the other, and it isn't long before they're _both_ growling and giddy, painted slick and warm and messy in each other's come.

_The art that inspired this came from SherlockedArt's Tumblr which she has sadly taken down. Go to my Tumblr at bit. ly/Y9fhu7 to see her pretty, pretty artwork._


	41. Buuzzzz

**Buuzzzz**

It began when Sherlock was a boy.

Began when he wasn't yet tall, when he was three and four and still lisped if he got excited or talked too fast, which was always. Back then, in those so-early days, he didn't have words for the busyness in his brain, didn't know other people didn't know what was in a wrapped-tight birthday box or behind bedroom doors, didn't know others didn't think, think, think so very fast about so very much, but he knew his head was noisy and loud and one day he stomped his little foot and yelled at the top of his lungs, "Buzz!"

Eleven-year-old Mycroft stopped drawing, drawing, drawing the periodic table from memory and looked at his sibling and waited.

The red-faced little boy yelled again. "Bzzzzzzzz!"

Mycroft had seen the signs but hadn't been sure; now he was. With a nod and an extended hand he said, "Come."

Wound up with he knew-not-what, vibrating with knowledge he was too young to understand, Sherlock just hollered that one word again.

So Mycroft nodded and whispered, "Yesssss. _Buzzzz,"_ and Sherlock nodded and grew quiet and he laced little fingers into big.

The sky was blue, the grass behind the back garden gone long and wheat-field pale. Mycroft carried his brother on his back and after awhile they came to a quiet spot where Sherlock had never been but a place to which he'd wear his own meandering path within weeks. They came to a neighbor's field and her beehives.

Mycroft put Sherlock down and hand-in-hand they crept close, careful and quiet, until at last they knelt near the hives. For the next hour they peered at the busyness all around them; they sniffed and imagined they smelled honey; and for a long time the brothers listened and they listened to the bees soothe them sweet and soft.

_Yes,_ murmured the bees, _buzz. Buuuuzzzzz._

_Stunning artwork created by JustOneLastTrick (Google: JustOneLastTrick bees) made me think that so much of who Sherlock became would come from Mycroft—who had to deal with the buzzing in his head long before Sherlock did. I think the bees would have been one of many gifts—coping strategies—he'd have given his baby brother._


	42. Sentiment

**Sentiment**

It started in the bedroom.

Yes, it started there, the endearments John would murmur into Sherlock's mouth or ears or against the sweat of his skin as they made love.

"My sweet," he'd breathe, pushing his face into Sherlock's neck as Sherlock pushed into his body, "My love."

The first time John whispered such things, the second, even the third Sherlock was stunned to silence and briefly still. But that fourth time, oh that fourth time and every time after he moaned his hunger, he opened his mouth as if being fed.

So yes, it may have started in the bedroom, but once John understood how much Sherlock needed these sentiments, how starved he was for this tiny affection, well they certainly didn't stay there.

"Sweetheart," John would say on cold nights at a crime scene, then watch blood flush Sherlock's cheeks warm.

"My brilliant baby," he'd grin after another of Sherlock's public displays of petulant genius.

"Oh my little bee" he said once, right in Lestrade's office, and Sherlock was so surprised he stopped the quick buzz of his deductions and laughed.

Ah, but there's one endearment Sherlock loves above all, one he himself now uses though seldom, because they both know it's the very rarity of this sentiment that makes their hearts fly.

In the stillest of nights, after the longest of days, when it's most needed, most wanted, one of them will say soft and sweet against the other's temple…

"You are my angel, always…_my angel."_

_This was inspired by two things…Jessamy Griffith's beautiful artwork (Google: jessamygriffith inking done), and hearing the clip of Benedict singing as the angel Islington in "Neverwhere" (Google: Islington the angel sings)._ _So many angels, so many beautiful angels._


	43. Overwhelm Me

**Overwhelm Me**

Passion fades.

Because that feeling of fire and flight? Well it can't go on forever. Soon enough you land in a world where cases call for paperwork, bills need paying, and the milk's gone mouldy again.

It's fine, it's all fine. Because passion may fade, but it can flare with just a tiny bit of fuel.

Sherlock started it, seven or eight years after they were married, long after they had their pick of cases, full coffers, a day-to-day life steady, almost quiet.

It was after a late night at the Yard. Sherlock stopped in a shadowy mews, a still and solitary corner right in the heart of London. He pressed his back against rough brown brick and, breathing suddenly fast, he whispered to John, "Overwhelm me."

And so it began.

That first time the doctor took the detective's breath away, turning him round, sliding a hand almost-tight over mouth and nose, jerking Sherlock off against those dark bricks.

Months later it was John whispering, and Sherlock scratching his husband so heart-rampingly hard there was blood, just a bit.

And on and on it goes, over years that grow more calm and quiet, because that's what well-lived lives tend to do. Every little while, every few weeks, maybe months, one of them will remind the other that each day is what they make of it, and so today let's make of it something intense, irresistible, a little bit wonderfully dark.

Down a shadowed street, in bed, in places they shouldn't be, one will metaphorically bare himself and beg, demand, keen…and the other will do as bid and both their hearts will soar.

Passion fades, oh yes, but sometimes the only fuel you need to set the whole world on fire are words, just a few.

_Overwhelm me._

_Right away Taikova's beautiful artwork (tinyurl dot com slash taikova30) said to me, clear as if it too had words: _overwhelming. _And so that inspired this. Thank you Taikova!_


	44. Judgment Day

**Judgment Day**

Sherlock sees everything, and John once worried those faultless eyes would find each and every fault of _his._

Oh, understand, the good doctor's full of swagger, confidence, a hearty dose of _fuck you._ He's never apologised for his height, his weight, for scars or blemishes, because John Watson's got poise aplenty and if you don't like what you see, well you can god damn go elsewhere.

Ah, but then came Sherlock.

Sherlock the beautiful, Sherlock the lean. Sherlock with the witch's eyes that see and see and see. John knew he saw every blemish, all the grey hair, each ounce softening the line of John's jaw.

And so without knowing it, the good doctor waited for Sherlock's judgment…and sure enough it came.

It was a few months after they'd married, after a framed photo taken at a Met party fell, shattering glass.

John had been ready to bin the lot, but Sherlock had plucked the photo from John's hands, said he'd fix it.

"Oh that'll never happen and you know it. Give over, I'll frame something else. Always think I look a bit pudgy in that one anyway."

And that's when the judging began.

"Yes," Sherlock breathed, emphatically not 'giving over,' instead resting long fingers over a starburst of broken glass. "You look absolutely _fat._ With contentment. With peace. With biscuits." Sherlock giggled. "I watched you thieving from that buffet all night, when you thought no one was looking."

Sherlock ran his palm along frame's edge. "There's wrinkles here, too. Do you see? The corners of your eyes, all creased with joy, no, no, with terrible puns. Oh I remember, you were awful with them then. Wonderful. Awful."

Sherlock's voice went to a whisper. "Look at you, _look at you. _You're a bit drunk, you're happy. _Look_ John. Look. You…" Sherlock finally handed the broken picture over. "…you let me make you…happy."

Yes Sherlock can see _everything,_ and if you're lucky, if you're very lucky, if you're John Watson, Sherlock will see _you._

___Kuuttamo's beautiful art inspires me, as always. And this one — tinyurl dot com slash kuuttamowedding—originally created for the wonderful AnnaCarrota, inspired this. Thank you Kuuttamo! (And this one's for you Livia, feel better my dear!)_


	45. The Bigger Man

**The Bigger Man**

For a big man Sherlock seldom uses his size to get what he wants.

No, the consulting detective favours dominating with words, dazzling with deduction, using mind and mouth to confuse as often as he clarifies, because oh god it's just much more _fun._

But when he's uncertain about a case, when clues don't add up, witnesses are lying, and suspects just not suspect _enough,_ Sherlock can get into a self-doubting spiral. The curse is he's too good at what he does to well-tolerate the times he's _not._

That's when Sherlock uses that big body and that's when Sherlock _takes._

Because John makes him.

It started a long-ago night when Sherlock was frustrated, getting close to a kind of quiet that's never good, and John pushed into his space, into his damned face…then deferred the moment Sherlock pushed back.

"Stop it, John."

Oh John stopped all right, right there and then, so in the way that Sherlock had to _make him move._

And wasn't that a sudden little bit of wonderful?

The sheer physicality of pushing John, _placing_ him, using his greater weight to, right there and then, hold John down and down and down…oh it was a glorious spiral of a different sort. In taking control of John's body, in stripping it, spreading it, biting and sucking and fucking it, Sherlock was again able to take control of his own whirring mind.

By the time he climbed on top and came, the consulting genius knew who and when.

After pressing a hand to John's mouth, snaking down his body, and making John come, Sherlock knew where and why.

And by the time Sherlock yawned, told John to make him tea, and John turned over and muttered, "Make it your fucking self," Sherlock knew that the biggest man in 221B was then, and would always be, the littlest one.

_Artwork from the wonderful Doublenegativemeansyes (Google: doublenegativemeansyes "that was amazing") inspired this, and the story is for her, too. She wanted a bottom!John tale. I'm hoping this was a wee bit of what you were looking for my dear! Thank you again for your wonderful artwork._


	46. Queen Bee

**Queen Bee**

The bee dreams started when Sherlock was four.

The first time he woke from one he stared at his tiny hands, wondering what had happened to him. When he realised those pale, wiggling fingers were what his body _really_ looked like he cried in great wracking sobs, unable to explain to anyone what was wrong.

The next dream came three years later, the next almost five after that, and though he's had fewer than a dozen, Sherlock remembers each with the sharpness of memory.

They're always dreams of hives and honey and the buzzing hum of life. He dreams his back bears wings and his spine a stinger, and most of all he dreams he's one of so very many, he's among, with, _part of._

Never alone, Sherlock is touched everywhere and touches back, drowsy little antenna dancing across the bodies of his kin, his queen, and there are no uncertainties or questions, just one sweet goal: Help the colony thrive.

Though he's had these dreams as long as he can remember, Sherlock never thought to share them, and then one night, a few years after _me_ became _we,_ his midnight laughter woke them both.

"What is it," John murmured, "What's made you so happy?"

There in early-morning dark Sherlock told him, and then told him more, sharing each and every buzzing adventure.

And then a rare thing happened: The next night they each woke to John's soft giggle, and in the dark Sherlock danced pale fingers over his lover's body, filling the silence with dreamy deduction.

"You brought the queen honey, a dozen times a dozen kinds. You flew everywhere, took just a little from so many neighboring hives. You danced for her, you touched her, you mated."

Sherlock wrapped his long body around John's, grinned against his ear, "I was the queen."

They'll change through the years, these two, needs and dreams waxing and waning, but one thing will remain forever fixed: No longer alone, they'll be part of, with, they'll be _us_ and _we_…forever and always their own sweet colony.

_From fine antenna to sharp stinger, Chellokoru's beautiful Beelock (Google: Chellokoru 45592652805) was irresistible from the moment I saw it. Thank you for this sweet artwork, Chellokoru!_


	47. The Look

**The Look**

The Look didn't start with Sherlock, oh hell no. John was straight-up, no-nonsense _way_ the fuck before he knew a certain cranky consulting detective.

The good doctor's legendary look started the day he did rounds with his first batch of interns, the first time he was actually responsible for other people.

Years later, by the time he and Sherlock fell hard into one another's orbit, The Look was without flaw and so evocative with _Your shit? I'm taking precisely none of it,_ that within weeks Sherlock learned to 1) avoid it entirely and 2) court it constantly.

Because here's the thing you have to know about John's look: There's nothing else he sees when he's turned it on you. You are it. You're _everything._

So maybe that's why Sherlock's such an absolute _dick_ when John's _not_ looking. Maybe that's why he'll talk too loud, offend a witness, kick Anderson's beehive, just damn well stir shit up—because he wants that look turned on him, he wants to be everything John sees.

And when Sherlock pulls his Sherlock shit? Well John _will_ look, of course he will, that's how this works. Sherlock needs and John wants to be needed. That's their balance. It may seem strange from the outside, unhinged on occasion, outright screwed-up, but know this: Whatever you think of whatever they've got, that thing goes beyond words and—there's no other way to say it—into myth.

So Sherlock will strive, by any means necessary, to be worth looking at.

And John? Well, John's going to damn well _look._

_The second I saw Evankart's artwork (tinyurl dot com/evankart-art), I figured this was the story it told. It is, isn't it? I mean look at him._


	48. Open and Shut

**Open and Shut**

"So which one?"

John placed a small box next to his reclining lover, crawled back onto the bed beside him. "I was thinking smell."

"Good. I'm ready."

John ran a thumb over Sherlock's eyes. "Now keep them shut."

"Of course. That's the point."

The _point—_and it'd been John's idea—was for them to while away a case-free day putting a Sherlock sense other than sight through its paces.

"Still ready."

"Hang on." Vague sounds, then something bumping against the box. "Here's the first."

"Talcum powder."

"That was quick."

"Too easy."

_"Take _it easy."

"You have to make it har—"

Sherlock shut up, sniffed. Exhaled sharply, sniffed again. "One of those lemony boiled sweets you like."

John ran a finger down Sherlock's nose. "Next one's harder."

"Promises, promises."

A hefty pinch. A baritone grumble. Then: "How about this?"

Sherlock sniffed once. Twice. "Sharp. Medicinal." He opened his mouth, breathed in deep. "Oh! Aspirin." Murmured approval. "Excellent."

"Told you this'd be interesting." Another rustle. "This one's tougher."

Sherlock took a deep breath. Probed the air with his tongue. Waved his hands to waft the scent.

"It's…" He sucked a breath through his teeth, as if tasting fine wine. "…vaguely plastic." More tongue. More wafting. More sucking. "Your new laptop cover?"

John clucked. "That'd be cheating. It's medical tape. Things you'd find on or in the human body, remember?"

Sherlock muttered. The mattress dipped. Long seconds passed. Then the air right in front of his face moved.

Sherlock sniffed slow. More slowly the second time. Slower still the third. Then he exhaled, his breath pooling warm against his own face.

"Me," he whispered.

He reached blindly, found John's hand hovering in front of him, pressed the slick palm over his own mouth and nose, breathed in and in and in. "It's me. On you."

John stretched out beside him and Sherlock snaked his free hand between his lover's legs. "S'cheating," he murmured. "Not going to find _me_ on or in any one but…" He snaked further, back to where John was still wet. "…you."

Eyes closed Sherlock wriggled down John's body, nuzzling-sniffing-smelling along the way.

And before long they were both breathing fast and deep.

_At first I wanted to write an ode to Sherlock's beauty because would you just look at __Asandalinbelgravia__'s artwork (Google: asandalinbelgravia 47114052527)? Then I wondered…why does Sherlock have his eyes closed? Thank you for your gorgeous work, Asandalinbelgravia!_


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